TIP # 5 Play as much chess as you can
• Quite simply, the more you play, the more you understand. You can read about rook endgames all day long, but it won ' t mean a thing until you actually play some rook endgames. Likewise, nothing teaches us what we don ' t know the way playing chess games does; until you completely blow a Rook endgame, you might not realize that you need to study Rook endgames. Conversely, few things are as satisfying as learning a new chess concept and then successfully applying it in a game. To be good at chess, you have to play chess.
TIP # 6 Write down or record the moves to every game you play
• Obviously if you ' re playing a blitz game face to face with someone( as opposed to over the Internet), you ' re not going to be able to record the moves. But for games at a reasonably long time controls( I ' ve written down moves for games with a ten minute limit), as well as for Internet games, you should record your moves. If you ' re playing online chess, there ' s no reason not to record your moves( even in blitz or bullet games); most sites have a feature that keeps track of your moves and lets you download the game score( or will send it to you via e-mail) at the click of a button. If you own a chess program with database features, you should create a database of your own games( both online games and games played face to face); if you don ' t have such a program, keep your games in a notebook or chess score book. There are plenty of good reasons for keeping your games. If nothing else, they ' re a record of your chess exploits; over time, you ' ll be able to go back over old games you ' ve played and see how you ' ve improved. When you play a really good game, you ' ll be able to replay it as often as you like if you recorded the moves. If you play an awful game, you can go over it to try to learn where you made your mistakes. Keeping your games in an electronic database gives you the chance to analyze them with a chess engine later; it also makes it easy to add your own notes and variations to the game. That brings us directly to the next tip:
62 chessking. com